Naxals' Foreign Links
9 May 2014
By Deepak Kumar Nayak
This external pagearticle was originally published September 2013 by external pagewww.geopolitics.in
The arrest of India’s most wanted terrorist, Syed Abdul Karim Tunda, on August 16, 2013, from an area on the Indo-Nepal border was a big achievement, as he is believed to be involved in 40 terror attacks, including the 1993 Mumbai blasts that killed 257 people and a series of bomb blasts in Delhi in the 1990s. He was a prized catch on the terror list. The most striking aspect of Tunda is that he knows virtually everyone in the who’s who list of terror. His arrest is not only important for his role in spreading terror but also highly useful for the fight against the Maoist insurgency in the country.
During the course of interrogation, Tunda revealed and reconfirmed the links of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI)-backed terror outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) with the Naxal movement in India. Despite the fact that he has admitted to the link, he is yet to give names or exact information about the alliance or its durability. However, this is not the first instance someone has revealed that the ISI has close liaisons with the Naxal organisation. Earlier, Lashkar operative Moham med Omer Madani allegedly said that he arrived in India in May 2009 to initiate the ISI’s support to the Maoist insurgency.
And, before he could do so, he was arrested by the Delhi police. Madani’s diaries also provided a detailed picture of the plans being made by the ISI to dismember India through the Maoist insurgency. It is believed that both groups intended to establish a joint base in south India. In a confidential report, the Intelligence Bureau had pointed out that nearly 500 Naxalites had undergone training with the banned Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) in the Vagamon hills on the Idduki-Kottayam border in 2008. In fact, Madani himself had carried out extensive research into the Maoists’ organisational structure and functioning and had also been receiving fake currency to fund terror activities in India.
Of course, it is well-known that in the past the Maoists had close links with the LTTE of Sri Lanka and that they procured small arms from China through Nepal, thanks to their fraternal ties with the Nepali Maoists. But the Pakistani connection of the Maoists did not invite the attention it deserved, though the ISI’s alliance with the Maoists can be traced back to 2005.
A thorough analysis of nearly three hundred ammunition fired by Maoists during an encounter with the security forces on January 8, 2005 revealed that many had the markings of a Pakistani ordnance factory. Moreover, several of these bullets matched those that were used in the notorious ISI-sponsored attack on the Parliament complex in New Delhi on December 13, 2001.
In October 2012, West Bengal DGP Naparajit Mukherjee -- for the first time a senior officer of his stature -- went on record to blame the ISI for helping Maoists carry out anti-government activities in the state. The ISI was having close liaisons with some pro-Naxal overground organisations through the banned SIMI in West Bengal and helping them to instigate people against the government, he said.
In the aftermath of the recent brutal Maoist attack on the convoy of the Congress leaders and workers and their security personnel in which 30 persons, including Mahendra Karma, the architect of the Salwa Judum, were killed in Chhattisgarh on May 25, 2013, tagging Naxals as the ‘’biggest terrorists’’, Chief Minister Raman Singh said they could have links with the Lashkar-e-Taiba.
Speaking about whatever intelligence that had been gathered on the alleged close ties of the ISI and Maoists, the recent arrest of Tunda is definitely a big achievement in the fight against terrorism. According to R P N Singh, Minister of State for Home Affairs, Tunda was the bomb expert for the LeT and also was into circulating fake Indian currency from bordering countries. The Delhi police has said that apart from active participation in planning and coordinating terror attacks, Tunda had also been training others in making bombs. One of the worst attacks came in 1993 in Mumbai when bombs went off in multiple sites. Since then, the police have been searching for Tunda for his alleged role in the blasts and for bombings in Delhi in 1997- 1998 and other cities.
It is important to note that Tunda also was part of a module that was involved in helping the Rohingya Muslims. Rightly, Dr Ajai Sahni, security analyst with the Institute for Conflict Management, opined “He is an active terrorist and as they grow older, the greater the aura, following and capacity to inspire others. There is no retirement age for terrorists.”
The fight against Maoist insurgency coupled with international terror links will be tough. As it is, the well-known global intelligence company, Stratfor, has revealed that the Maoists have acquired a vast and diverse collection of foreign weapons. The nexus between the ISI and Maoists came to fore when one Maoist zonal commander had spent more than $70,214 on procuring weapons and armaments while another $20,604 was spent on the supplies. This reportedly pointed to the fact that the Maoists were flush with funds remitted from abroad through hawala channels. And as the Naxals are only focused on disrupting the concept of democracy as they do not have any belief in parliamentary democracy, in order to overthrow the Indian state they would align with any force even if it is anti-national like that of LeT and ISI to further their cause. The Naxals have also realised that if they are keen to carry this conflict forward with the Indian security forces stepping up the heat, they need better equipment and hence they have given in to the offer made from across the border.
Intelligence Bureau reports indicate that “the Gulf to Kerala” is the biggest hawala route where large sums of money transfer have made terrorist-funding a global trend. According to the Union Ministry of Home Affairs, the annual remittance through the hawala networks into Kerala alone is to the tune of a whopping Rs 20,000 crore, most in any state, part of which is utilized to spread Islamic terror. Given this kind of assistance and support to the Naxals by the LeT, it will be a tough task for the Indian government to contain Maoist insurgency.
Stratfor’s “Global Intelligence” files accessed and released by Wiki leaks in March 2012 abundantly referred to several instances of cooperation between LeT operatives and Maoists in India. There is sufficient proof that the Pakistan based militants and their foot soldiers in India are desperately trying to set up sleeper-cells in the vicinity with the help of the Maoists as the areas dominated by them for recruitment. Apparently, Indian intelligence agencies are aware of the ISI-Maoist nexus and how it plans to manipulate Indian Muslims, but the Indian government is hesitating due to the adverse effect it may cast on the India-Pakistan relations.
According to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Naxalism has been the biggest internal security challenge for India. Now, after the reported revelation and reconfirmation that the LeT is hand-in-glove with the Naxals, the broad trajectory of Maoist insurgency is highly menacing. The time has come to question the Union Government’s wilful silence on the huge evidence that is now available pointing to definite linkages between the Maoists and the Inter-Services Intelligence of Pakistan which is in a constant bid to destabilise the Indian state. The Union Government has to choke the supply of arms and funds being pumped into the Maoist insurgency by the ISI. Last but not the least, the buck has to stop somewhere in order to defeat the purpose of the enemy of the country, and some concrete steps have to be undertaken before they spread their terror tentacles.